Bo Jackson

• Date of birth: November 30, 1962
• Place of birth: Bessemer, Alabama

Football and baseball player

Jackson was one of the most acclaimed college and professional athletes of his time, a rare star who was able to succeed in both football and baseball. He also became a media icon thanks to Nike’s “Bo Knows” advertising campaign.

Early Life

Bo Jackson was born Vincent Edward Jackson on November 30, 1962, in Bessemer, Alabama. The eighth of ten children, Jackson was named for Vince Edwards, star of the television series Ben Casey. His father, A. D. Adams, also the father of two of his sisters, never married his mother, Florence Jackson Bond, who worked as a custodian. Jackson saw Adams, who had another family on the other side of Bessemer, only as someone who came by every few weeks and left twenty dollars for his second family.

Jackson grew up in Raimond, a rural community outside Bessemer, in a three-room house without indoor plumbing, the ten children sharing beds or sleeping on the floor. Some relatives thought he was like a wild boar and began calling him “Boar,” which soon was shortened to “Bo.” His wild behavior included throwing rocks through windows and at other children. When Jackson was thirteen, he and some friends killed several pigs belonging to a minister. They were caught and forced to take odd jobs until they could make restitution. Realizing how close he had come to a jail sentence, Jackson decided to reform. While still in junior high, he made the varsity track team at McAdory High School in McCalla, Alabama. Jackson’s coach, Dick Atchison, became his mentor, teaching him how to channel his anger into athletics.

Life’s Work

In high school, Jackson set state records in the 60- and 100-yard dashes and hurdles, the high jump, and the long jump. He was an outstanding pitcher and hitter in baseball and, in football, an all-state running back as a senior. Jackson became a football star immediately at Auburn University in 1982, running for 123 yards and 2 touchdowns in his first game. Despite such success, he was homesick and considered leaving Auburn but was talked into staying by Bobby Wallace, the Auburn assistant coach who had recruited him. A few days later, Jackson scored the winning touchdown when Auburn beat archrival Alabama for the first time in ten years.

Jackson averaged 7.7 yards per carry the next season, saving his best performance for a 23–20 win over Alabama in which he ran for 256 yards and two touchdowns. He was voted most valuable player (MVP) in Auburn’s 9–7 victory over Michigan in the Sugar Bowl. In 1984, he missed six games with a separated shoulder. Jackson won the 1985 Heisman Trophy as the nation’s best college football player after gaining 1,786 yards. He finished his career as Auburn’s all-time leading runner with 4,303 yards. Jackson accomplished all this while also competing in baseball and track. As a freshman, he was the conference’s first three-sport letterman in twenty years.

In 1986, Jackson was faced with choosing between professional baseball and football careers. Drafted by both the Kansas City Royals of Major League Baseball (MLB) and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers of the National Football League (NFL), he chose the Royals and less money because his primary dream had been to play professional baseball. Jackson made his Kansas City debut in September 1986 and hit a towering home run in his seventh game. Certain that Jackson could be persuaded to play football, Los Angeles Raiders owner Al Davis offered him a five-year contract that would allow him to join the team at the end of each baseball season.

Jackson set a Kansas City rookie record in 1987 by hitting 22 home runs. But he struck out 159 times and tied a major league record by striking out five times in one game. Jackson joined the Raiders for the second half of the season and averaged 6.8 yards per carry. He set a team record by rushing for 221 yards in one game and broke another with a 91-yard touchdown run.

In 1988, Jackson became the first Royal with at least 25 home runs and 25 stolen bases in a season despite missing a month with a leg injury. With the Raiders, however, his rushing average dropped to 4.3 yards per carry. He finished fourth in the American League in 1989 with 32 home runs and 105 runs batted in but led the league with 172 strikeouts. Jackson enhanced his legend with a throw from the left-field corner that arrived at home plate on the fly to beat a base runner. Jackson was named MVP of the All-Star Game after recording three hits—including a home run—and a stolen base. Back with the Raiders, he gained 950 yards, averaged 5.5 yards per carry, and broke his team record with a 92-yard touchdown run, becoming the first player in NFL history with two touchdown runs longer than 90 yards.

In 1990, Jackson hit home runs in his first three at-bats in a game against the New York Yankees only to injure his shoulder diving for a fly ball. After missing more than five weeks, he returned to the Royals lineup and hit a home run in his first plate appearance, becoming the nineteenth player in major league history to hit home runs in four consecutive at-bats. He hit 28 home runs that season and had a career-high .272 batting average. Jackson then rushed for 698 yards for the Raiders, averaging 5.6 yards per carry.

A hip injury at the end of the 1991 season ended Jackson’s football career. The Royals released him, and although he was signed by the Chicago White Sox, he played only one month in 1991 before having the hip-replacement surgery that caused him to miss the 1992 season. Jackson promised his mother he would hit a home run for her when he returned to baseball in 1993, but she died before he hit a home run in his first at-bat. Jackson ended his athletic career with the California Angels in 1994.

As a star athlete in two professional sports, Jackson was a major American celebrity. He had endorsement deals with AT&T, Cheerios, Nike, and Pepsi, earning approximately $5 million a year during the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was credited with increasing Nike’s sales from 80 million pairs of shoes in 1987 to 280 million in 1990 through his “Bo Knows” television advertisements in which he played not only baseball and football but also basketball, cricket, hockey, soccer, tennis, and even guitar alongside blues legend Bo Diddley.

In 1990, Jackson returned to Auburn to complete his degree while his wife, Linda, attended graduate school. Linda Jackson received a doctorate in education in 1992, while her husband earned his degree in family and child development in 1995. The father of three children himself, Jackson tried for years to establish a relationship with his own father, succeeding only after he retired from sports. In 2007, he created the Bo Jackson Elite Sports Complex in Lockport, Illinois, near his home in Burr Ridge. Jackson also became involved in numerous causes devoted to education, including the Give Me a Chance Foundation, a nonprofit he founded in 2008. In 2009, he delivered the commencement speech at Auburn University. He was a 2011 recipient of the NCAA Silver Anniversary Reward from the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).

In April 2012, Jackson went on a five day bike ride across Alabama to commemorate the first anniversary of the April 27, 2011 tornadoes, a disaster in which hundreds of people lost their lives and many more lost their homes. The following year, Jackson established Bo Bikes Bama, an annual fund-raising bike ride to support the Alabama Governor's Emergency Relief Fund for natural disaster relief, community safe rooms, and warning sirens.

Significance

Jackson was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1998, and ESPN ranked him as the eighth best college football player ever. He was the first American professional athlete to be an All-Star in two sports, playing in football’s Pro Bowl in 1990. Many observers felt that he could have had a Hall of Fame career in either baseball or football had he concentrated on one sport and avoided injuries. Jackson was one of the greatest all-around athletes ever in the United States.

Bibliography

Hoffer, Richard. “What Bo Knows Now.” Sports Illustrated, vol. 83, no. 19, 1995, pp. 52–57.

Jackson, Bo, and Dick Schaap. Bo Knows Bo. Doubleday, 1989.

Neumann, Thomas. “Ten Things to Know on the 25th Anniversary of Bo Jackson's Final NFL Game.” ESPN, 13 Jan. 2016, www.espn.com/nfl/story/‗/id/14559718/bo-jackson-10-things-know-25th-anniversary-final-nfl-game. Accessed 27 Mar. 2017.

Nightengale, Bob. “Years Later, Bo Still Knows: 2-Sport Great Returning to Scene of All-Star Glory.” USA Today, 13 July 2010.

Nightengale, Bob. “Bo Jackson's Startling Hindsight: I Would Have Never Played Football.” USA Today, 12 Jan. 2017, www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/columnist/bob-nightengale/2017/01/12/bo-jackson-football-cte-mlb/96492338. Accessed 27 Mar. 2017.